Brick manufacturer prosecuted after worker injured

Northcot Brick Ltd fined £18,500 after worker sustains serious leg and foot injuries

BRICK manufacturers Northcot Brick Ltd have been fined after one of their employees was seriously injured at the company’s Station Road site, in Blockley, Gloucestershire, on 27 February 2014.

Stroud Magistrates’ Court heard that a 45-year-old worker sustained serious injuries to his right leg, with the partial loss of two toes, after either stepping or falling on to a recently installed machine that breaks up clay.

A risk assessment had identified that the machinery required guarding or barriers, but these had yet to be put in place at the time of the incident.

Northcot Brick Ltd were fined £18,500, plus costs of £7,500, after pleading guilty to a breach of Regulation 2(1) of the Health and Safety at Work etc. Act 1974.

Speaking after the hearing, HSE Inspector Ann Linden said: ‘This incident would not have happened if simple precautions such as putting up a barrier or guard had been in place. Safeguards cannot be relaxed because a machine is being commissioned or tested.’